Voidfall and the Contentification of Board Games

I don’t see the appeal. Is there really a market for boring twilight imperium? That combat seems like the most anti-fun system ever invented.

I think the content angle is valid. However, I like the contentification of crowdfunding games. Way too many games on crowdfunding are too singular in their "usage". Crowdfunding games take up huge amounts of shelf space. If I can get a big, nice crowdfunding game that has good solo, cooperative and competitive modes I would rather take that one, instead of another big game in the same vein that has only one of these modes. Even if that single mode was designed better. The shelf space consideration is quite real and more significant to me and pprobably many other potential backers as well.

Here is my angry comment for the algorithm: „You suck!“
No, honestly, your review was amazing. 🤓

Your accent has a hint of something East European. Slovenian, Romanian, something like that. Reminds me of Slavoj Zizek

EDIT: Lithuanian?

The military and whisks go hand in hand.

Nice review, on point

I'm not sure how anyone was confused about whether this was a euro when it was advertised as a euro. Like. Literally no dice, no randomness, and euro action selection was the ENTIRE campaign.

I have a real problem with board games turning into cardboard gore across my table, with them having so many different bits that they take hours of time just for each player to eventually grasp the rules. A board game should have the fewest bits (or kinds of bits) necessary to achieve the mechanics of its theme, and so I get annoyed whenever we have multiple types of resources, counters, tokens, cards, pieces, tables and scoring sheets. It feels like some companies think in terms of videogame GUIs and mechanics, where lots of bits are very easy to manage.

they used rules better suited for a video game in a tabletop. Seen that before.

Cones of dunshire or bust

What in the world, so complicated. No, thanks. I'd rather play Endless Space 2, Stellaris, etc.

As a board gamer with no friends, I buy games as objet d'art.

That is an insta-buy. It will look amazing stacked in the cupboard with the rest of them.

Smashed that like button.... c'mon Efka. Everyone knows that if you want your video to be a success, you don't hit the like button.

You have to smash it.

Pass

The solution is simple. Regular version, and a deluxe version with expansions. If you're the kind of person who buys tons of board games and only plays them a few times, buy the regular game. If you're the kind who buys fewer games but plays the hell out of them, buy the deluxe version.

Whenever I see something designed by Ian, it's like yeah it's my type of game and it guarantee to be some fun of untanglin, great video!

Scythe in space but twice as complicated. -woof. Appreciate the video essay! 😆

When you started talking about the amount of scenarios I directly got the feeling that it was too much stuff in the box. And then the contentification tangent happened. From the sound of it there could have been a great base game and some expansions on top of it. Separate out everything to do with co-op and some groups of scenarios. Give everything to the backers and start selling the base game to the general public.

I stumbled across your channel looking for a captioned tutorial on Voidfall. I was very pleasely surprised to see this video being captioned properly (auto captioning is a steaming hot pile of garbage).

Definitely will check out your other videos and let my Discord server for Deaf board gamers know.

And by the way excellent video. Like your style.

Complexity is a matter of preference, but some gamers out there take it as a badge of honor. They think liking complex games makes them look smarter. Then they proceed to bash simpler games, just because they are less complex. For me, it's a matter of practicality. When I was young, with tons of time on my hands, I would often buy the biggest most complex games I could find. It was challenge and I had plenty of time to deal with it. Now I have far less time for such things, so I opt for less complex games. Less complexity means easier set up, less time reading and more time playing.

This bad overcomplex twilight imperium looks like a great video game.

The galactic events feel kind of bland with just mechanics. It would have been cool if there was some kind of story description for each event to build out the lore of the setting.

As a design-enthusiast, my head hurts just looking at your table..

Very well done and entertaining.

I am very glad that Voidfall exists. We played it for the first time two nights ago, and I loved the fact that the map was so sprawling that there was no need to attack each other (it only became possible to do so late in the game anyway). When games are complex, I like the lower player interaction, because then, even in a competitive game, we can help each other understand the rules and the implications of our decisions without too much personal detriment.

I was apprehensive at first about Voidfall because it looked too much like a miniatures game when the point is to crush each other player, which is not interesting to me (no malice towards people who enjoy that style of game, but I just don’t). Contrast that with what I actually got, which was a Euro game in space with track advancement, resource production, and heavily branched decision trees, which was completely up my alley.

I think this is going to get played again. I quite liked it! Thanks for the review!

This is the best board game review, and game review presentation I've seen in years. Extremely informative, great pacing, and FUN. I'll be back for sure!

Voidfall and NPI, it couldn't appeal, and yet.... I thought they would say it was too difficult :) I, however, respect them

To me, this feels like the game has been stocked full of mechanics for the sake of having them. There's a ton of tokens, and gadgets, and gizmos and whatnot and none of it is even remotely streamlined to serve some kind of gameplay purpose. There's no visible underlying structure to anything. I really like the theme of this game, the art is so beautiful, but I can't even finish a setup video without losing attention, and I regularly play TI4.

great review, you basically nailed my impression of the game: overly complex for no benefit. I love heavy euro game but this one seems to try to be too many things at the same time. Your last 5 minutes was particularly on point

I just don't understand why so many praise the "pretty math, group solitaire" games. What's the point of meeting and playing IN PERSON just to sit in silence and do your own math problems?

I don't agree with some of the negative points on this review. Regarding the symbology, it is so well thought out that after a couple of plays you'll have no issues interpreting the symbols; if you are a normal person, your own enthusiasm for getting into the game and a little bit of common sense will be enough. And regarding the combat sequence, the claim that because there's an app then it is too difficult it's just not true, the game makes it very easy to remember the sequence; again, it will flow nicely just after a couple of games. And about the setup time, the common claim that it is a 40 min setup is an exaggeration, I have the retail edition with all the components well sorted using baggies, and my setup takes around 20 min for a solo game; it will take a little longer depending on the player count and scenario, but not much longer than what you could expect from a heavy euro.

Trying to decide between Voidfall, Eclipse, and Fractal. When you said it's like Scythe in space weirdly for me that sold me. 🤷‍♂️

Looks like it suffers the same problem as Gaia Project: You really don't do much for the complexity it offers! I prefer games where you actually do something and are not brooding over every little small step, but you haven't done much at the end of the game! I really ask myself what these people think who develop these games! They probably think TOO MUCH! Take more inspiration from expert games like Ark Nova or Nucleum where you are actually doing stuff for the complexity it offers and you don't have to overthink every step! Thank You very much for this good review!!

Love your reviews in general and enjoy your content but I will say after getting comfortable with voidfall hour set up is a massive stretch. Its 20-25 minutes which is still enough but nowhere close to an hour and setting up the board and all the techs is incredible

If you can you should review “Space Empires 4x” I love that game.

Okay. I hit the button.

Well, it really was a positive review. Thank you for that!😁

Angry comment to boost the video!

Wow !...............philosophy !

This…um….actually really sold me on the game. But I don’t know if I have a group for it 😕 it looks kind of like a civilization game meets Lisboa but with some guided scenarios. It’s still in shrink, but I think I’ll keep it around a bit longer to see if it can hit the table.

one of the worst games I have ever played. authors really wanted to do it as complicated and foul as possible. they definitely managed to achieve that. is if fun to play this game? hell no.
with similar mechanics I would better play Concordia or Brass

100% true

Been wanting to try this one. Euros are not my favorite, but I still give ‘em a chance at least twice!

I don't even play boardgames, but your videos are reallly entertaining/fun to have on.
Thanks!

insightful video. you make some really great comments on game design

You know so much of gaming

I need this game for understanding it's icons. I want to test my icon ability

before u said a word i agreed with u ...there are so many games where a bunch of extra stuff is added just to make it seem better than the current hot games....but i find that you can strip away a bunch of fluff and these games would still function as intended and still maintain the fun factor it may have